Tears of Lost Innocence
by Kitsanken
Summary: EDITED. Much can be hidden by the rain. . .but again, much can be revealed. Explore the complexities of the troubled heart.


**Rurouni Kenshin Fanfic**

_Rurouni Kenshin & Samurai X Original Japanese Version © N. Watsuki/Shueisha Fuji-TV SME Visual Works Inc. Sony Pictures Entertainment_

_All Fanfics created by Chiruken (me) were written for the sole purpose of shared entertainment and not intended for publication or sale._

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**Tears of Lost Innocence**

_By: Chiruken_

I lift my face up to the sky, watching as the clouds gather rapidly, far-off thunder rumbling in the distance, accompanied by the occasional flashing glow of lightning rippling along the undersides of the angry-looking clouds, illuminating the dull steel grey as it alters to charcoal, black…the colour of bruises… I slowly lower my gaze again, watching as the trees sway in the rising wind, the leaves sighing mournfully, the tall grass lining the rutted dirt road moaning as it bends under the onslaught, the scent of rain assaulting my senses. I know instinctively that the storm isn't far off…I can feel the electricity making my hair stand on end, sense the moisture on the air, feel my lungs filling with the high humidity… Kami-sama but I hate the rain. I hate everything about it…the damp, the cold, the sound…just everything.

I reach up and scrub my face wearily, wishing with desperate futility that the storm would dissipate…pass me by, continue on to release its force elsewhere…anywhere but where I am…but I know it's useless. I can't stop the rain from falling anymore than I can stop the nightmares from rolling around in my mind while I sleep or the voices from echoing through my mind while I'm awake. Always when it rains, the memories threaten to drown me…the raindrops falling like tears, washing me in grief and hopelessness, the guilt rising up like bile, threatening to choke me. And then in my mind, the rain turns to blood and I know, deep down, that I caused it…that I caused the rain to bleed…that I caused all those souls to wail accusations on the wind, howling for vengeance…and I know with a certainty that I lost something more precious than my sanity when I first picked up that old and rusted wakizashi all those years ago in the rain. That night when I made the rain bleed for the first time…and I smiled…I smiled…I smiled…yet…under it all, hidden by the rain washing over me, turning the rivers of red to streams of pink, hiding the scent of blood with the odor of freshly made mud, washing my bruised and battered, blood-soaked body…I cried. I cried…yet I smiled through it all…I smiled, while deep inside my heart broke…and I knew that I was lost.

I loathe the rain as it falls, slowly at first, tiny drops pattering sporadically down to splash against my face…the sound loud as it echoes in my mind…slowly splatting against the dry, dusty, thirsty ground, rings of dust rising up with each lazy drop before a wet spot appears, only to be soaked up by the parched earth, only to be replaced by another droplet and another and another until the sporadic drops come faster, tinkling against the fluttering leaves of the swaying trees lining the road upon which I'm frozen, standing between the deeply grooved ruts staring straight ahead, eyes wide and staring…I must be quite the sight. I feel a smile tugging at the corners of my mouth, another smile…another smile masking the tears. The rain falls faster now, soaking through my haori and gi, streaking mud along my dusty hakama and still I stand in the road smiling. It's a desperate expression, this I know. I tilt my face up again and let the drops splatter against my face, closing my eyes, feeling the wetness on my cheeks, dripping from my chin and still I smile. I can't stop smiling because if I do…if I stop smiling if even for a moment…I know…I know I'll start screaming, ranting, hurling profanities at the sky and the clouds and the rain…and I'll cry again. If I stop smiling, I may as well admit that I cried all those years ago. If I stop smiling…there'll be nothing left for me. I'll be empty. Again. Broken, just like my katana. Just like…just like my dreams.

I draw in a shuddering breath, but still I stand motionless in the middle of the road, ignoring everything around me. I'm smiling and while it rains, I can pretend that's all I'm doing. I hate the rain because when it rains I'm free to break down…free to let the hurt out. I hate the rain because the rain masks the truth, but somewhere, somewhere there is someone who knows the truth and didn't need the rain to see it. Somewhere out there, far from where I stand being drenched in the cold, stinging rain, is someone who saw passed the smile, knew it for what it was…and I hate him for it. I hate him because he saw me…saw into my heart and saw the wounds and wished to heal them. He saw passed the smile I wore and looked into my soul and didn't flinch back from the darkness stretching before him. Instead…instead he wished to send light. And I hate him for that. I hate him as I hate the rain. He didn't condemn me…he understood. And I hate that. I didn't want him to understand. I wanted to kill him. But…but I couldn't. He was like the rain. I hated him for seeing passed my smile to the truth. But I couldn't kill him because to kill him…it would have been like snuffing out the sun. I wanted to bask in the warmth of his brilliance. And I hated him for that. And I love him. I love him and that is why I hate him. I didn't want to be saved…but he saved me. And I love him for that. He stretched out his hand and he saved me. He shone with all the brilliance within his pure soul…and I was blinded by his greatness. And that is why I hate him. I didn't want to be reminded how dull I was…how utterly desolate my life had become…how shriveled and decayed my own soul had become.

I open my eyes and stare up at the weeping sky, feeling the sting of raindrops on my upturned face and I remember his eyes…the compassion, the understanding…and I clench my hands into fists at my sides as I feel my chest tighten as my smile slips a little. What is he doing now? Is he staring up at the sky just like me? Smiling as the rain washes over him? Running like tears down his cheeks to drip off his chin? I feel my smile slip some more and I desperately try to push memories of my savior from my mind, not wanting to think of him any longer, lest the pain leak through, washing my smile away in a flood of tears. He tore my life apart…nullified everything I had lived for up 'til the point when I met him…and told me to find my own truth. He stole my purpose away, and replaced it with uncertainty. But that isn't why I hate him. For that…for that I could love him because he showed me another path. But I do hate him…I hate him for abandoning me…for setting me on this path with no guidance beyond his words urging me to find my own truth…and I hate him because the truth I've found is terrifying…and agonizing.

I close my eyes and try desperately to find my smile again, but it is lost. It slipped and now it's gone. All that is left are my tears mingling with the rain as it falls down my face. I try again to summon a smile, even a pathetically weak smile…but it's gone. Gone. Erased by the rain. Erased by the memories. And it's all his fault. His fault for reminding me that I am alive. For reminding me that I wasn't always this way. That once, long, long ago…years before we met…years before my defeat…that I had been able to cry. I cried because my heart was free. And then I made the rain bleed and the mud turned red and I couldn't cry anymore because my heart was shackled…the grief too strong to be held…and my smile was all that saved me. All that saved me from falling and drowning in the red rivers flowing across the muddied ground…flowing across my soul, obliterating the sun, hiding the warmth, turning me cold, freezing me…and I smiled. I retreated within myself and found my strength in a smile. But now that's gone. Washed away in the rain as it soaks through my clothes, chilling me to the bone and my smile is gone. I no longer have protection against the memories. I hate the rain. It strips me and leaves me naked…exposed for all to see. My weakness is on display as it rains and my smile slips away and still the rain falls.

I hate the rain. The rain tore my innocence from me…as I swung the wakizahi desperately, the rain washed down, the lightning illuminating the brutal loss of my innocence as one by one I slashed and stabbed and blood fell with the rain as the thunder drowned out the screams. I killed. I killed them all. And I stood after, holding the bloody wakizashi, the rain washing over my bruised and battered body, splashing against my face, washing the blood away…mine, theirs, did it matter? I smiled. I smiled and allowed the rain to wash away the tears. I ignored the horror rising within me and turned, smiling, to my liberator…my downfall. I smiled and allowed the rain to wash away the evidence of my tears and walked away, never looking back at the horrors I left behind, and pretended that all was right, and I smiled.

And now…now when I desperately need to smile…I can't. Instead, I fall to my knees in the mud, my hands the only thing stopping me from falling face first in the muck, and I cry. It hurts. My eyes burn with the unfamiliar sensation of tears forming, my chest aches as I fight to breathe passed the sobs catching in my throat. I curl my fingers into the mud, needing that stability as my world tilts crazily. The tears mingle with the rain and they're warm. For a moment I'm distracted from the pain and I pause within my misery to acknowledge that tears are warmer than rain. The thought is lost in the booming crash of thunder above me and I look up…slowly…I look up and I see two men etched into the clouds. On one side, flames leap up, licking at the figure, and I know that it is lightning, yet it terrifies me and I cringe back into the mud. On the other side, streaks of red crisscross the figure, running, dripping almost as if to represent blood…and I know that it is the sun, yet this too terrifies me and I hear a soft sound. It takes a moment for me to identify it as a whimper. It takes a moment longer for me to realize that this sound emerged from my throat. I blink the rain and tears from my eyes and stare. The images are gone. No longer there. No longer before me. Gone. I tremble in the mud, chilled to the bone, yet my face is warm…warm from my tears…and I smile.

Slowly I stand, dripping water and mud, tears mingled with the rain, no longer separate, and I smile as I stare down the road, the empty deserted road and slowly, I begin to walk. I found my smile again. It isn't the same as before…it no longer replaces the tears…it no longer hurts to smile. I smile now, because, unlike a few minutes ago, an eternity ago, I know that I can cry, that I can wash the grief with tears. And so I smile, because I am free again, free to let the tears flow, cleansing the guilt and fear from my soul. I may not have my innocence, that was lost too many years ago to try to salvage it now, but I have found my humanity. I can continue on my path, seek my own truth, and I can face another day with a smile. But this, I think, is a healthy smile. One that doesn't mask, but shows. Perhaps, someday, I'll be able to cry without the rain. Perhaps, someday, the wounds within my heart and soul will heal. Perhaps…perhaps then a smile with be just that…a smile, not a mask. I want to be free to smile again…naturally, no longer hiding behind it. I want the world to see me…me…Seta Soujiro, not the Tenken, but me…not Shishio Makoto's assassin, but me…not the smiling assassin, but me…I want the world to know who I am…I don't want to be a shadow anymore. I want to be free…I want to live…I want to feel…and so…I will welcome the rain…I will cry and welcome the rain…but still…somewhere deep inside, I know I'll always hate the rain that stole my innocence. The rain that hid my tears of lost innocence.

_**Owari**_


End file.
